don't need the money

if you've been through the 26th of July bridge/me7war in the past 2 weeks you would've seen a huge billboard that says:

Dr.Tamer Something
C H E E R S
Soon To Leave the Bachelor World

i'm sorry i do not have its picture, but i'll try to take a photo of it soon.

why would someone do that? a billboard that size on that road would cost alot of money - around 100,000 LE a year. which means that if he rented it for only a month that would be around 8000 LE.

not only that, he rented 2 billboards, so that you could see it if you're going to the 6th of October City, or the other direction - to mohandeseen. which means he spent at least 16000 LE to let people know he's getting married.

why?

unless this is some creative way of advertising a new product or something, which i doubt because i don't see how they can make a connection, then i'm afraid something's wrong with this fellow.

lots of stuff going on.

i was able to keep my word this time and not smoke sheesha for one full month... i know i'll eventually get back to it (i can't imagine summer without smoking sheesha), but it's good to know that i still have some determination left in me when i need it.

in the past few weeks i got like 4 different job offers and i didn't even graduate yet...i didn't apply anywhere either, i get these phone calls from a friend's friend or a distant relative's acquaintance telling me that as soon as i'm done with the graduation project i should go and work in their architectural firm. cool. but that doesn't change the fact that i'm still gonna be spending A LOT of time considering which career i'm going to get myself into first.


my brother's wedding is tonight. he wants me to give a small speech/toast in the wedding. i don't know what i'm gonna say. also the whole dancing bit i talked about before in my earlier posts is making me nervous.

my graduation project is turning into a nightmare. we were supposed to submit our pre-final phase a week ago, and i didn't. i'm really falling behind in the project. the professor gave me a final chance to submit it next saturday. that gives me thursday and friday to work on it. and as you already know i can't work today because it's my brother's wedding. so that leaves me tomorrow only to finish up my whole project. sort of an impossible task but i'll do my best.


ok gotta run.

found in facebook

random thoughts

- i feel safer with a tank full of gas than with a pocket full of money
maybe that's because i live far away from the city... maybe it's because i own a credit card.

- i've been told several times that using credit cards to borrow money via ATMs is considered "7aram", yet i still use it occasionally.

- five years ago, i would spend most of my free time watching tv... now i only watch tv once a week or so, and it's only to see Amr adib's "el qahira al youm" or "el 3ashera masa2an" on dream tv...

- i enjoyed watching the interview with naguib sawiris in "el 3ashera masa2an" a couple of days ago..i was surprised to see him shed tears in front of the camera.

- i'm 3 weeks away from graduation and i'm not excited. i hate college, but i'm afraid of the responsibility of achieving my dreams...i don't want to be another "mowazaf" who waits till the first day of the month to get his paycheck and goes home to his routine-saturated life.

- i'm worried i'll get called to do the military services after i graduate which will waste another 1-3 years of my life.

- i'm bored

facebook

i finally joined facebook to see what all the fuss is about.

not impressed so far.

tagged

tagged by ravine


How evil are you?

i hate it when this happens

i get a missed call on my cell phone from a friend of mine, so i call back to see what's up.


me: alo
him: aywa yabni ezayak
me: tammam ahl, eh el akhbar?
him: enta fel beet?
me: aywa
him: tab kallemny 3al beet delwa2ty
me: tab wenta matkallemtesh 3al beet mel awel leh?
him: makontesh 3aref enak fel beet
me: tayeb.


i call him at home.

him: aywa ba2ollak, hateegy el koleya bokra?
me: isa
him : tab ok..c u there isa..


and this is normally where i slam the phone down in his face.
he couldn't have just said these three words on the cell phone and got it over with??!

funny commercials from youtube

yesterday

yesterday was a big day. i woke up to a phone call from my cousin telling me he's in haram and he doesn't have a car, begging me to go pick him up since he's in no mood to go to home (heliopolis) using public transportation.

after i brought him back home with me we stayed for lunch then we started preparing ourselves for what we thought was going to be the highlight of the day: my sister was gonna be competing in the Virgin Megastore Treasure Hunt. if she wins she's gonna get a shopping voucher worth 10,000 LE to use in Virgin.

the competition was tight, she was going up against 2 other people, a boy and a girl, both around her age. to win the competition you have to know everything about virgin megastore (how the products are sorted out inside the store) so that if they ask you to find the Superman DVD you should do so in the least time possible. i of course predicted that the boy was going to win it easily since he would be a faster runner and he would probably have had alot of time to memorize the place. we live in the 6th of october city, so my sister didn't have any chance to go to city stars just to look around...the boy on the other hand probably went there everyday.


when the competition started the guy was running all over the place like crazy...my sister and the other girl looked very lost. Fortunately, the guy did lose some time looking for a specific dvd. my sister was looking for the ricky martin cd and i found it right in front of me, so of course i showed her where it was which made the Virgin guys give me a few words about how unfair that it is and that i shouldn't let it happen again. of course the competition was far from over but that little tip i gave her probably had a lot to do with the final outcome.

my sister ended up winning:)

it turns out that she's not allowed to use the voucher to buy laptop computers, mobile phones, or big-screen tv's. she had to choose between PS3's, ipods, home theaters, dvds, books, music cds......

i was trying to stay away from her and let her make all the decisions, and her fiance was doing the same....everyone else (we were 9 people all together) was giving her all these suggestions that made her really confused...

she ended up getting 2 ipods (one ipod video for her and another ipod nano for yours truly) , PS2, all seasons of Dawsons Creek on dvd (she loves that show), 7 books or so, some music cds, and tons of accessories for the ipods and PS2.

she was really hesitating on whether she should get the PS3 or not but she decided not too since its too expensive and it would mean she would have to get much fewer books and dvd's...

surprisingly, that was not the highlight of my day.


on my way home i was driving too fast as usual. apparently i made a sudden move which caused another car to almost have a major accident....the guy caught up with me and he started giving me these gestures with his hand...he wasn't doing anything rude, it was more like a "what the hell are you doing?!" kind of gesture. i was confused since i didn't remember doing anything extra dangerous so i asked him to stop by the road to see what he was talking about... the guy (in his late 20's) seemed really tense and he started explaining to me that if he hadn't pushed the brakes i would probably be dead now. he gave me a lesson about how i should be considerate about other people's feelings including my parents.

i got the message. i apologized and got into my car, as i took off i saw him sitting inside his car with his friend all shocked and speechless.

i'll definitely drive more carefully in the future.

i'm back

no i wasn't in alex all this time. but i've been in a pretty bad mood since i came back. 2 funerals, almost no progress in the graduation project and an aching tooth that makes me want to kill myself, are some of the main reasons why i haven't been blogging.

i'm not the kind of guy that likes to share my feelings when i'm feeling down. i'm trying to change that a bit through blogging, but it's not as easy as i thought.

on the bright side, the past few days weren't so bad. in college we're celebrating our final year by organizing all kinds of activities for the whole class to attend together.
there was a 5 day trip to luxor and aswan ( didn't go ), a prom (didn't go to that either), and a fun day in college where we all wear the same t-shirts (designed by us) and we go around crashing lectures with the assistance of oriental instruments, trumpets, and of course our chanting voices. i was determined not to miss this one since i always felt jealous in my previous years when i saw the older students celebrating that day.

also yesterday one of our female colleagues was kind enough to invite us over for lunch at her home. we were about 15 students all together. after lunch we sat down in a circle and each one of us started imagining what the other students will be like in 10 years time. surprisingly, they all agreed that i was going to be some sort of bill gates. and they all agreed that i wasn't going to work in the architectural field at all. i guess they're right about that part, i don't feel like the architectural work environment in egypt is suitable for me. too much routine.

to clear my mind

need to relax....

off to alex for a couple of days.

graduation project

i'm currently working on my graduation project which is the rehabilitation and re-designing of any part of egypt that consists of a beautiful, valuable building with a poor surrounding environment. lots of those around, eh? the pyramids, the train station in ramses square, the temples in luxor, etc..

i chose to work on the region surrounding Salah el Din's citadel. that place is packed with beautiful islamic monuments but is also a home to a very poor sector of the egyptian public. supposedly my plan will be to remove those homes and move them to a new bigger, cleaner, better planned neighborhood in one of the new cities in cairo like 6th of october or 10th of ramadan....then i'm going to use the empty land that's left to make some sort of big project that suits the region and acts as a high-class tourist attraction. i'm still not sure what exactly the project will be but i'm thinking about maybe a large islamic museum but not a typical one...one that shows the lifestyle of the egyptian people in that period of time, sort of like the pharoanic village we have now but islamic instead....of course any better ideas are highly appreciated but please keep in mind that the project does have to suit the surrounding enviroment which means that i can't go and build an olympic stadium there for example...the place is very historic and rich with beautiful mosques and stuff...


looking forward to your suggestions and ideas!

UPDATE: the pictures weren't uploaded correctly the first time, when i come back from alex i'll try posting them again.

who do you hate more?

if you had the choice to ban either the people driving too fast or those who drive too slow, who would you choose?

i would definitely ban all the very slow drivers.

laziness no more

i own a '97 opel corsa. i love my car but i do little to show it. little things keep getting worn out and i'm always too lazy to fix them. i always brag about loving my car despite it being the least classy of all five cars we own. whenever given the option to take any of our other cars to do an errand i always prefer taking my own car. because i love driving it. because i love hatchback cars. because i love how stable it is. because i love its control.

i'm the most lazy person i know. yesterday i woke up and decided to change that. i decided not to go to college and instead go to the mechanic and spend the day there fixing the millions of things i needed to fix in my car.

here's a list of some of the things that needed fixing:

• the cooling system was leaking
• the cooling system was all rusty and needed to get cleaned
• the wipers were worn out
• the water pump that supplies the wipers wasn't working
• the right rear-end lights weren't working
• the a/c wasn't working
• the cassette player wasn't working (only fm)
• the handbrake was weak
• the suspension system needed to be checked on

so after spending more than 8 hours with the mechanic here's what i did get fixed:

• cooling system fixed
• cooling system cleaned and changed coolant
  
• rear lights
• a/c
• suspension system
• handbrake

i didn't fix the wipers because there wasn't a near-by shop that sells them. the water pump needs to be replaced too but i won't do that anytime soon probably because winter's practically over and i could use the money.

the cassette player needs replacement too but i'm thinking of buying an mp3 player instead and hooking it up with the car speakers.

national champs

sorry for the slow blogging lately. after i came back from monofeya i had one day to rest then i started the National Chess Championships.

yes, you read right..the big event...it took place in nasr city and over 200 players participated, all very strong. The competition was 11 rounds in 12 days (1 rest day) and it just finished today.

its my first time participating in this event so i wasn't expecting any big results. overall i played some good chess but my results could've been better...i always had to do some mistake at the end of the game due to time trouble or just plain lack of concentration.

i ended up with a score of 6 out of 11 (4 wins, 4 draws, and 3 losses) which puts me in the the top 50 players of the tournament.

the tournament was very exhausting and i'm glad it's over. enough chess ba2a, two big chess tournaments in a row can't be good for my health. or mental stability.